Alien Abductions and GPS Camp

The past couple of years, my first 'mountain bike' ride (read: anything but pedaling dirt roads) has been the annual girls trip to Fruita during the end of April.  We inevitably decide to go big the first day to maximize our risk of heat-stroke and end up on Zion Curtain where I'm certain I'll ride the little rock drop with more grace than previously and proceed to bend a chain ring and/or smash a chain.  What's the saying about insanity being repeating the same exercise twice but expecting different results...?

 

This year, after two months of being snowbound, I headed out to Camp Lynda in St. George for three days of riding in the desert.  Chris sent me with the sole mission of taking a lot of pictures.  I took 13.  5 of them were blurry.  

Regardless, it's sort of neat to post pictures with colors other than white, blue, and green.

 

I finally got to do a CTR debrief with Cat on the drive out.  It's good to know that there were at least two of us out there last summer with zero idea of how to use our GPS's (and coming into camp, we still didn't) and that the section of the route between Trail Angle Apple and the Spring Creek Trailhead really was spooky.  We traded theories on sleeping arrangements, gears versus single speeds, and Ethan.  CTR 2011 has definitely been on the forefront of my brain recently, so it was good to rehash 'Things Not to Do', like think that a Bongo Billy's breakfast burrito is enough food for a day and that four Snickers Bars, two packs of M&M's, and powdered drink mixes that I refused to drink would be enough calories for the 84 miles from Silverton to Durango.  

 

Camp.  Right.  We rode bikes.  Four hours the first day.

Six hours the second day. 

Seven hours the third day.  

It's the third day I'll remember.  Solo for 5 of the seven hours with only my blue breadcrumb trail slowly covering up the red breadcrumb trail on the GPS screen out in the alien abduction territory of northern Arizona and southern Utah.  My favorite part was passing three partially decomposed cows.  I didn't stop and take a picture.  I was afraid that if I stopped, the aliens hiding in the partially exposed rib cages would get me.

It's strange territory out there.  Harsh.  Unforgiving.  Spooky.  Big.  With clouds constantly threatening a deluge, it was a good exercise in remembering that there was nothing I could do that would change the weather, I could only keep pedaling.

It was a strange shock when I reemerged into civilization after hopping a highway fence, riding along an abandoned road, picking my way through fields of abandoned trails littered with goat heads wondering why I didn't re-Stans my tires like I was told (yes, all part of the GPS route.  Advice from the wise: Cross the 7 foot tall wire fence at the posts, not in the middle to avoid nearly dying/looking like a complete idiot and when Lynda says to put fresh Stans in your tires, she knows what she's talking about.  Actually, whenever she says anything (especially when it happens to relate to bikes), she tends to know what she's talking about, so I highly recommend listening). 

 

It was an even stranger shock to finally recognize where I was at mile 76 and then to finally follow the little red line to the very end, right back to where I started and once again realize that for the previous 7 hours, I didn't have a single useful thought on how to save the world.

 

Big thanks to Lynda and Dave for taking the time to put together camp, choosing perfect places for dinner, and letting those of us who haven't seen dirt in two months play on your trails.

Comments

[Grizzly Adam]

Well said! Another great weekend in the desert.

[Dave Byers]

Great riding with you Eszter! And nice work banging out Day 3. I was solo for a huge piece of it too and I agree your "spooky" comment. I had to laugh when I hucked my bike over the hwy fence cause I was expecting it, but it still didn't seem "right".

[Cat Morrison]

Thanks for making me laugh today. Just "Ethan" cracks me up. I appreciate your perspective on things.